Bingo.
It looks like we’re on to something, that Dallas was torched twice!
It appears the town was first burned (your record), Sept. 28, 1862, by soldiers serving in the 13th Illinois Cavalry (according to the Geraldine Sanders Smith citation from History of the 13th Illinois Cavalry, which I believe was written by Maj. Frederick Behlendorf, mentioned below). According to her report, only two houses were left standing.
That of course was well before Nov. 6, 1862 (my record), the day soldiers under Col. Albert Jackson, commanding officer of the 12th Cavalry, Missouri State Militia, put a torch to what I suppose remained of the town (the extent of the damage is not described in this record).
According to Silvana R. Siddall’s Missouri’s War: The Civil War in Documents, David Allan, a witness to the reported devastation, stated Nov. 14, 1862, after passing through the town, “the houses are all more or less destroyed.” Allan served as a private in the 29th Missouri Infantry. According to a history of his regiment, he and his comrades (from Cape Girardeau County) arrived at Camp Peterson near Dallas Nov. 14, 1862, en route to Camp Burnside, which the record states was two miles from Patterson in Wayne County, so Allan’s statement is supported by this record. Upon arrival at Camp Burnside the 29th Missouri Infantry was inspected by Brig. Gen. John W. Davidson, who commanded the District of St. Louis.
The raids on Dallas came after General Davidson put Col. Sempronius H. Boyd in charge of Union troops in Wayne, Bollinger, Cape Girardeau, Stoddard, Scott, and Butler counties Sept. 3, 1862, with headquarters at Greenville in Wayne County.
David Allan’s statement, per your posting, that Col. Frederick Hecker and the 24th Illinois Infantry may have come through Dallas in the spring of 1864 is obviously false, since Hecker resigned Dec. 23, 1861. If the infantrymen did in fact pass through, they likely were led by Hecker’s successor, Col. Goza Mihalotzy. But I see nothing in the history of the regiment to suggest it happened even though this appears: “On the 3d day of August [1861] a detachment of the 24th under Lt. Col. Mihalotzy was thrown forward to Centerville [the seat of Reynolds County], where Secession troops had gathered in force threatening communication with St. Louis.”
It appears the boys in the 13th Illinois Cavalry enjoyed burning things. Here’s a quotation for whatever it’s worth from a newspaper article I wrote earlier this year about the burning of Barnesville (now Ellington), Reynolds County: The burning of Barnesville was carried out by the 13th Illinois Cavalry, based at Greenville, according to a history of the regiment written after the war by one of its officers, Maj. Frederick Behlendorf. He recorded it in this fashion: “On August 7th, 1862, we saddled up and [went] to Van Buren to meet [Confederate Col. John T.] Coffee’s gang, which we did, charging and routing them. . . . The town of Van Buren was set afire and burned to the ground, this being a regular rebel headquarters. Shortly after our return to Greenville, we made another raid, on Barnesville, scattering the rebels wherever we found them and burning the town of Barnesville, for the same reason already given.” He didn’t mention it, but others have speculated these two torching operations may have been in retaliation for a deadly Confederate attack on Union troops near Greenville July 20, 1862. The Illinois raiders, led by Col. Joseph Warren Bell, returned to Barnesville in the spring of 1863 to make it their base of operations for several weeks. End quote.
Several from the 13th Illinois were in Arkansas during this period, but a good many others remained in Missouri under the command of others. Col. Bell was in command of all U.S. forces at Bayou Cache in Arkansas from July 7, 1862, until the arrival of Brig. Gen. William P. Benton, who was wed to a Wayne County widow during the time he resided there to supervise the building of what came to be known as Fort Benton at Patterson.
I have not seen them but I’d certainly appreciate having the opportunity to read the letters written by David Allan Jr. (1842-1917) from Cape Girardeau and Patterson, Missouri, from October to December of 1862. I am informed they are on file at the State Historical Society of Missouri in Columbia. It’s said he rose from the rank of private to captain and was mustered out at Washington, D.C., in June 1865. I take it that he spent all of his time in the 29th Missouri Infantry.
Was J.C. Rhodes your grandfather? He’s remembered as a widely known Puxico dentist. He grew up around Kime in Wayne County, which is where my mother spent her youth (on the river south of Greenville). The late June (Rhodes) Moore, born at Kime, was his niece. I visited in her Cape Girardeau home several times while gathering information for my book Wayne County’s Lost River Settlements (which is about the hamlets destroyed to clear the landscape for the development of Lake Wappapello). She was a very sharp, accommodating lady.
If you see anything wrong in what I’ve put together please let me know.
George, I appreciate your diligent labors.